News:

"There is a terrible desperation to the increasingly pathetic rationalizations from the climate denial camp. This comes as no surprise if you take the long view; every single undone paradigm in history has died kicking and screaming, and our current petroleum paradigm 🐉🦕🦖 is no different. The trick here is trying to figure out how we all make it to the new ⚡ paradigm without dying ☠️ right along with the old one, kicking, screaming or otherwise." - William Rivers Pitt

Pruitt is Wasting Your Money but the Real Scandal is How He’s Letting Polluters Sicken You

When embattled EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt appears in front of Congress next week, he’ll likely face tough questions about his illegal phone booth, his why his lobbyist/landlord resigned, his luxury travel, exorbitant pay raises and other scandals that have even the GOP expressing concern. That said, Pruitt’s made it a point to meet with tons of Koch and Mercer-funded climate denial organizations, and hardly any environmental groups, so he’s done a commendable job of shoring up support among those who value the “free market” over public well-being.

But while all the scandals over wasting taxpayer money are of course bad, wasting taxpayers’ lives is worse. And that’s what Pruitt’s “factory of bad ideas” is trying to do. Because not only is Pruitt actively rolling back public health protections, but what few new rules he is proposing are designed make things worse.

For example, one new policy is described by The Hill as “aimed specifically at helping polluters in the oil and gas industry” by letting them regulate themselves, in essence.

Another great new Pruitt idea, the Red Team attack on climate science, is also potentially back on the table, according to E&E. That’s because one of the main White House voices opposed to the effort was energy advisor Mike Catanzaro, who is being replaced by Francis Brooke, a 28-year-old known as “the kid.” We know the Red Team exercise is just a trick meant to confuse Americans about climate science. In this case, let’s hope tricks aren’t for “the kid,” but we won’t know until Brooke takes over.

On the rollbacks, EPA air chief Bill Wehrum told an environmental law conference that the Trump administration is still pondering what to do with regulations to limit mercury emissions from coal plants. Apparently the costs are too high to keep the rule in place, because as we all know, mercury is a totally benign and not at all worrisome pollutant. After all, it’s not mercury poisoning makes you mad as a hatter, or anything.. Oh and also, mercury makes the skin of children who are exposed turn pink and peel off. But who cares about pink kids, we’ve got coal to burn!

Yet somehow, it gets worse. Because Pruitt’s pro-smoking, Lamar Smith-pushed and front-group-backed policy to disqualify broad swaths of public health studies is moving forward, the EPA sent the proposed guidance to the White House Office of Management and Budget last week for interagency review.

But it’s such a bad idea, even one of Pruitt’s own aides, former chemical lobbyist Nancy Beck, expressed concerns in emails FOIA’d by the Union of Concerned Scientists. But she 😈 wasn’t worried that it would eliminate peer-reviewed, independent science. No, her concern was quite the opposite: that it would bar the use of industry studies.

And we all know how much industry loves its studies to find its products to be a public health hazard…

EPA chief Scott Pruitt held meetings with the lobbyist married to his DC landlord despite previous statements from the agency and the lobbying firm to the contrary. On Friday, The Hill reported that filings from lobbying firm Williams & Jensen revealed that the firm's principal, Kevin Hart, reached out to the EPA this year on behalf of client Smithfield Foods. Multiple outlets reported Saturday that Pruitt had taken meetings with Smithfield executives and Hart, whose wife rented Pruitt a condo on Capitol Hill on a $50-night basis, in July of 2017. Hart announced Saturday that he would step down as the chairman of Williams & Jensen, while the New York Times this weekend ran an extensive investigation into Pruitt's hidden potential conflicts of interest linking the EPA to Oklahoma, including Pruitt's use of a shell company to purchase a home from a lobbyist.

NGO Shipbreaking Platform: 152 Ships Broken Up on South Asia’s Beaches in First Quarter of 2018

April 27, 2018 by gCaptain

Shipbreaking at Alang, India.

Of the 206 ships dismantled worldwide up in in the first quarter of 2018, a total 152 ships ended up on beaches in South Asia, according to a quarterly report from the NGO Shipbreaking Platform.So far this year, 10 workers have lost their lives and 2 workers have been severely injured when breaking ships in Chittagong, Bangladesh, the organization said their report. At least two workers also lost their lives due to a toxic gas leak at a shipbreaking yard in Alang, India in March, according to the report.

During the first quarter of 2018, 27 ships were also dismantled in Turkey, 7 in China, 11 in Europe and 9 in the rest of the world, the report showed.

“Ship owners continue to sell their ships to the beaching yards despite the well documented deplorable conditions. The prices offered for ships this first quarter have been high in South Asia, especially when compared to the figures of last year. Whilst a South Asian beaching yard can pay about USD 450/LDT, Turkish and Chinese yards are respectively currently paying USD 280/LDT and USD 210/LDT. This situation led to especially a significant decrease in number of vessels recycled in China, where only 7 vessels were scrapped this quarter,” the NGO Shipbreaking Platform said.

According to the NGO, South Korean and UAE ship owners sold the most ships to South Asian yards the first quarter of 2018 with 14 beached vessels each, followed by Greek and Russian owners. Shipping companies from the United States beached 5 vessels.

“South Korean Sinokor is, for now, the worst corporate dumper with seven vessels beached in South Asia in 2018. South Korean H-Line Shipping is a close runner-up, with five ships sold for dirty and dangerous scrapping on the beach. Following the ban on the import of tankers to Pakistan due to major explosions that occurred in 2016 and 2017, no tankers were sold to the Gadani yards this first quarter. However, Pakistan has re-opened to the import of tankers this week,” the organization said.

Meanwhile, only 3 ships had a European flag – Belgium, Italy and Norway – when they arrived on the beach.

“All ships sold to the beaching yards pass via the hands of scrap-dealers, also known as cash-buyers, that often re-register and re-flag the vessel on its last voyage,” the NGO Shipbreaking Platform said. “In this regard, flags of convenience, in particular those that are grey- and black-listed under the Paris MoU, are used by cash-buyers to send ships to the worst breaking locations. Almost half of the ships sold to South Asia this quarter changed flag to the grey- and black-listed registries of Comoros, Niue, Palau and St. Kitts and Nevis just weeks before hitting the beach. These flags are not typically used during the operational life of ships and offer ‘last voyage registration’ discounts. They are grey- and black-listed due to their poor implementation of international maritime law.”

According to 2017 data released by the NGO Shipbreaking Platform in February, of the 835 large ocean-going commercial ships that were sold for scrap in 2017, a total of 543 ships were intentionally run ashore and dismantled by hand at shipbreaking yards in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, where the controversial ‘beaching’ method continues to be the predominant means of disposal for end-of-life vessels.

The 543 ships represent just over 80% of the total tonnage scrapped worldwide last year, according to the organization.

PBS NewsHour reported this weekend from Guayama, Puerto Rico, where the island's only coal-fired power plant and coal ash industrial facility may be contributing to the high incidences of cancer, respiratory problems and heart disease in surrounding neighborhoods.

Local concern is growing over how Hurricane Maria may have further compromised public health, after the plant's owner failed to cover ash piles during the storm and released a report last month showing "dramatic" increases in arsenic and chromium in groundwater in the months following Maria.

Eighteen U.S states are taking the EPA to court over weakening emission regulations

LAST UPDATED ON MAY 2ND, 2018 AT 10:29 PM BY ALEXANDRU MICU

A coalition of 18 U.S states is suing the current administration over “arbitrary and capricious” moves to weaken air quality regulations.

Eighteen states will take representatives of the Trump administration to court. In a move championed by the golden state of California, they will fight against the administration’s revisions of Obama-era car greenhouse gas emission rules — one of his most significant measures against climate change.

Together, the states hold roughly 43% of the U.S.’s cars and are understandably angry at the EPA’s moves to weaken current car emission regulation. They aim to “set aside and hold unlawful” the newer (and weaker, compared to those adopted in 2012) fuel economy standards, which are slated to take effect in 2022.

According to The New York Times, the Trump administration said the standards were too stringent and began legal procedures to revise them. The EPA hasn’t offered any new standards, instead choosing to draft regulation that weakens existing ones post-2020. In other words, we’re not talking about a different take or a paradigm shift here — just a simple, old-fashioned cut.

The NYT explains that after executives from General Motors, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler visited the White House to request more lenient emissions rules, Trump’s administration began to try and roll back the standards. The Agency claims that the standards are “based on outdated information” and that new data suggests “the current standards may be too stringent.” For context, these standards aimed to raise efficiency requirements to about 50 miles per gallon by 2025.

The states, however, contend that the EPA acted “arbitrarily and capriciously” in changing these rules, in direct opposition to their citizens’ best interests. Furthermore, they hold that the EPA under Pruitt violated the Clean Air Act and didn’t follow its own regulations.

The lawsuit comes just days after learning that the Department of Transportation is planning to propose freezing fuel economy standards at model year 2020 levels, Politico adds.

“The federal standard the states are suing to protect is estimated to reduce carbon pollution equivalent to 134 coal power plants burning for a year, and save drivers $1,650 per vehicle,” the states said.

Which, you have to admit, sounds pretty sweet. There’s something for everybody, no matter if you care about the environment or your bottom line. No matter how this plays out, we’re likely to look at a protracted legal battle as both sides seem intent to see it through to the bitter end.

“My message to the EPA and Administrator Pruitt is simple: Do your job. Regulate carbon pollution from vehicles,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said at a press conference on Tuesday. “We are not looking to pick a fight with the Trump administration, but we are ready for one.”

“This is about health, it’s about life and death,” adds California Gov. Jerry Brown. “I’m going to fight it with everything I can.”

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Agelbert NOTE: The following educational video with excellent graphics is rather optimistic. WHY? To begin with, the available carbon budget (the amount of GHG emissions we can still generate without exceeding the 2 degree celsius increase in temperature) is actually in the rear view mirror. IOW, we have already blown through that budget and are well on the way to a 4 degree C increase (with an accelerating RATE of increase, NOT a linear or slowing rate of increase) BEFORE the end of this century. Also, there is no discussion of the methane contribution. both from fracking activity and from the melting of the permafrost and the release of the vast (over a HUNDRED times🔥🌡️ the current GHG emissions warming 🔥🌡️ effect) shallow arctic sea methane clathrates, all of which require the immediate banning of the burning of fossil fuels and a crash program to get the CO2 level back to 350 PPM (at least - 300 PPM would be ideal).

While the following graphics are correct in portraying the vast amount of fossil fuels that can still be extracted to be burned (which is irrefutable evidence that "peak" oil will NOT save us from Catastrophic Climate Change ), the claim that we can still burn SOME fossil fuels is not based on the reality of the Runaway Greenhouse Situation we are in.

Together with the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), the Urban Complexity Lab of the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam (FHP) developed an animated short movie that visualizes the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of the past – and the possible future.

Scientists Discovered a Dead Zone the Size of Florida 😨 in the Gulf of Oman

But the damage doesn’t have to be permanent.

SNIPPET:

Scientists recently identified a dead zone as large as Florida in the Gulf of Oman. The 65,755 square mile area is now devoid of marine life due, in large part, to climate change and human pollution.

The increasing size of dead zones in the ocean is threatening the animal populations in our oceans and leading to the destruction of underwater life. But scientists say the damage doesn’t have to be permanent. One study has called for further investigation of the Gulf of Oman to understand how to manage the fisheries and ecosystems of the Western Indian Ocean to prevent dead zones from widening.

The wellhead has crac ked along the length of the pipe. It's believed the crack formed in December when the well was shut in over the winter. EPA

Trucks have removed more than 1,400 tons of contaminated soil following a large oil spill on the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana, The Billings Gazette reported.

Cleanup is still ongoing. So far, more than 50 large dump trucks full of soil have been removed with more to come, the publication noted.

An estimated 600 barrels of oil and 90,000 barrels of brine (production water) leaked from an Anadarko Minerals Inc. wellhead that was shut in and last inspected in December. It is believed that the wellhead might have frozen and crac ked over the winter, leading to the spill.

Basically, the investors are saying this type of drilling doesn’t make sense anymore. It’s time to start thinking of more long-term ways to make money (like, uh, renewables). On top of that, the American public is not down with tearing up ANWR. Investors gotta protect their reps.

Most important of all, however, is the way this drilling sacrifices human rights in the name of profit. The letter acknowledges the Gwich’in’s cultural ties to these lands, and how any drilling that causes the Porcupine caribou herd to suffer would in term harm this indigenous group.

The Gwich’in, for their part, have been actively fighting potential drilling in ANWR since at least the 1980s, when the idea first started gaining steam. They put out their own letter Monday alongside the investors’.

Three judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals issued a decision that canceled a key permit for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, a 600-mile long project that would travel from West Virginia to North Carolina. The panel found that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services (FWS) didn’t set clear limits on how the Dominion Energy-owned pipeline would impact threatened or endangered species in the Biological Opinion required under the Endangered Species Act.

This opinion includes an Incidental Take Statement, which is the issue here. “Take” means “harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect,” per the FWS. As plaintiffs argued—and the court agreed—the federal agency granted Dominion Energy this permit under “indeterminate” limits on the “take” of certain species, including a migratory shorebird called the piping plover, and sea turtles. The federal agency never clarified what percentage of threatened or endangered species are allowed to be killed during construction, reports the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Plaintiffs, which include the Sierra Club, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Virginia Wilderness Committee, filed this lawsuit (among others) against the Department of Interior and FWS back in January. The pipeline has met serious opposition from environmentalists throughout its proposed route—and not only for the ways it could harm wildlife.

Local advocates worry about air pollution from compression station sites concentrating near a black community in North Carolina. There’s also the Haliwa-Saponi Indian Tribe, which feels it wasn’t properly consulted.

“This fracked gas project has been proven to be perilous to our health, our communities, and wildlife, and now, thanks to tonight’s ruling, must be stopped,” said Sierra Club Attorney Nathan Matthews, in a press release.

The Atlantic Coast Pipeline is set to be completed by the end of this year. This decision won’t halt all construction, so the project should stay on schedule for now. Earther contacted Dominion Energy for comment and will update upon a response.

Workers carry a rope line to fasten a decommissioned ship at the Alang shipyard in Gujarat, India, in this March 27, 2015 file photo. REUTERS/Amit Dave/Files

By Jonathan Saul and Simon Jessop LONDON, May 15 (Reuters)

SNIPPET:

The shipping industry has long been criticized by campaigners for allowing vessels to be broken up on beaches, endangering workers and polluting the sea and sand.

Now, it is being called to account from a quarter that may have a bit more clout – its financial backers.

Norway’s $1 trillion Oil Fund, a leader in ethical investing, in February sold its stake in four firms because they scrap on the beach.

Three of the firms excluded by Norway’s fund – Taiwan’s Evergreen Marine, Precious Shipping and Thoresen Thai Agencies (TTA) of Thailand – say they have been unfairly singled out. The fourth, Korea Line, declined to comment.

Norwegian life insurer KLP soon followed, selling shares in the one of the four it owned and blacklisting the other three.

Further exclusions are likely, said KLP, the fund and its advisory Council on Ethics. The council’s chief adviser, Aslak Skancke, said the divestments had already effected wider change, including encouraging companies to seek cleaner scrapping.

The fund contacted several firms in its portfolio during its investigation, Skancke said, “and when we made them aware of the possibility of exclusion from the fund, they … decided to change their policy.” He declined to name the companies.

hree leading pensions funds – Caisse de Depot, CCP and OMERS – are reviewing their investments in shipping over ethical and green considerations, a finance source familiar with the matter said. OMERS declined to comment. Caisse de Depot and CCP did not respond to requests for comment.

The steps add to momentum on the issue from European Union regulators and courts, in particular pressure to measure up to standards for inclusion on the EU’s list of approved ship-breaking yards, which is due to be updated later this year.

It’s a revolution that has been a long time coming, environmental, labor and human rights activists say. But a transition won’t be easy, for owners or breakers.

More than 80 percent of aging commercial ships are broken up on the beaches of Bangladesh, Pakistan and India.

Industry leaders in South Asia say they cannot afford to upgrade their sites and remain competitive.

The Deepwater Enterprise conducts operations to mitigate the effects of the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill, May 23, 2010. U.S. Coast Guard Photo

By Kelly Gilblom (Bloomberg) — After paying more than $65 billion in legal costs for the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, BP Plc is wary of the risk of lawsuits related to climate change.

Chief Executive Officer Bob Dudley raised the topic of class-action lawsuits twice during the company’s annual general meeting in Manchester, England on Monday, saying he wouldn’t disclose certain climate targets, or even answer some questions from activist investors, because the risk of legal action in the U.S. was too high.

“You want to get us to make statements here in front of you that you can document that will lead to a class action,” Dudley said in response to one question from the Union of Concerned Scientists about pending U.S. litigation against energy companies. Such legal actions are “a business model in the United States,” he said.

The sharp exchange between BP and two advocacy groups — Amnesty International and the Union of Concerned Scientists — shows the growing pressure on major oil companies to acknowledge their responsibility for emissions of greenhouse gases. It also reflects the burgeoning efforts to hold them legally responsible for the potentially disastrous consequences of rising global temperatures.

Lawsuit Fodder

“BP could be on the hook for millions, if not billions of dollars,” Kathy Mulvey, accountability campaign director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said in a statement. “Why wouldn’t shareholders want to know about the risk of legal liability, a risk that’s growing rapidly as climate costs multiply.”

In response to another questioner who suggested that selling oil and gas should be considered a violation of human rights, Dudley warned shareholders this could be another attempt to mire BP in a class-action suit. An open letter from shareholders including Aviva Plc last week urging more transparency could also end up providing lawsuit fodder, he said.

“BP 😈 absolutely believes in being transparent. Transparency is beneficial to all,” Dudley said. “But we don’t want climate disclosures to be a tool for class-action lawyers.”

A group of families have filed a lawsuit against the European Union for failing to protect citizens against the impacts of climate change. It's the first climate lawsuit at EU level.

A total of ten families from five EU countries, Kenya and Fiji, as well as a Swedish youth organization, are taking the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union to court. They say the EU is violating their fundamental rights of life, health, livelihood and property by failing to combat global warming.

The People's Climate Case, as the lawsuit has been dubbed, was filed with the European General Court on May 24. It argues that the EU's 2030 climate target of reducing domestic greenhouse gas emissions by at least 40 percent compared to 1990 levels, is inadequate. Instead, they are demanding a reduction of at least 50 to 60 percent by 2030.

The plaintiffs argue that three EU emission regulation legal acts, issued as part of the 2030 climate target, still allow for high levels of greenhouse gases to be emitted. They are asking the EU to raise the target in defense of the fundamental rights of citizens — not just of those living in Europe, but also beyond its borders, who suffer from climate change as a result of EU emissions.

Unprecedented case

"This court case is incredibly important and unique because it's addressing the European Union as a whole and not individual states," Stefan Küper, press spokesperson for the NGO Germanwatch, which is supporting the People's Climate Case, told DW.

"This is vital, because it's the EU that's responsible for setting minimum thresholds for the climate policy of EU member states, not the member states themselves. They can be more ambitious than the set guidelines if they want, but they have to stick to the minimum threshold."

The EU is responsible for 10 percent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions, which makes it the third largest emitter after China and the United States.

"What also makes this court case so unique is that it's about fundamental rights. It's asking the EU to take its own values seriously and base its policies on the values the EU stands for," Küper said.

“I thought it was a joke," said Jordan, who works with at-risk youth in Toledo’s inner city. He went back to sleep. When he got up a few hours later, he took a shower and had a cup of coffee, then turned on the news.

“They were saying don't drink the water, don’t take a shower – the water is messed up,” Jordan said. “You couldn’t even touch the water. It was something you could not believe was happening here in Toledo.”

That was Aug. 2, 2014. For the next three days, half a million people in and around this industrial city at the western edge of Lake Erie scrambled to find safe water.

Many drove hours across state borders to stand in long lines at stores that hadn’t sold out of bottled water. Some stores were charging $40 for a case of water that usually costs less than $5. Jordan, unaffected by his shower and coffee, helped set up distribution centers for free water, and helped deliver it to seniors and mothers with babies. The National Guard sent tanker trucks full of drinking water to the city.

The panic was set off by a toxin called microcystin, the byproduct of an enormous bloom of blue-green algae that had invaded Lake Erie. The bloom – technically not algae, but photosynthetic single-celled organisms called cyanobacteria – blanketed vast expanses of the lake with what looked like thick, sickly green split-pea soup. It was triggered by chemical pollution from farm fertilizers and industrial sources into the lake, which supplies the region’s tap water.

Toledo was the first large U.S. city where toxic blooms made tap water unsafe for human consumption. But it may not be the last.

No government agency collects nationwide data on toxic blooms. But EWG’s research found news reports of almost 300 blooms in lakes, rivers and bays in 48 states and the Gulf of Mexico since 2010. Based on those reports, the problem appears to have worsened over the past few years.

In 2010, there were just three reports of toxic blooms in the U.S. In 2015, there were 15, including the largest to date in Lake Erie, although the bacteria did not get into Toledo’s drinking water. In 2016, there were 51, including a huge bloom in Florida that prompted the state to declare an emergency in four counties on the Atlantic Coast. Last year, 169 blooms were reported. And in March, Ohio Gov. John Kasich declared the open waters of western Lake Erie “impaired for recreation” – an unprecedented designation that under the federal Clean Water Act will require the development and enforcement of plans to reduce toxic blooms.